Byron Scott will be introduced today as the Los Angeles Lakers new coach, returning to the team he played with for 11 seasons, including as the starting shooting guard on three NBA championship teams in the 1980s.
“I am ecstatic to once again be a Laker and to have the opportunity to work alongside Mitch and the Buss family,” Scott said on Monday, after Mitch Kupchak, the team’s general manager, announced that Scott had signed a multi-year contract.
“I know firsthand what it takes to bring a championship to this city, and as someone who both grew up in L.A. and played the majority of my career here, I know how passionate and dedicated our fans are. I will give everything I have to fulfill the championship expectations that our supporters have for us, and that we have for ourselves.”
Kupchak said that Scott “has proven himself at the highest levels of the game as both a player and a coach in his almost 30 years of NBA experience.”
“His leadership skills and track record for success make him the ideal person to lead this franchise forward.”
Scott succeeds Mike D’Antoni, who resigned in April after the team posted a 27-55 record in the 2013-14 season, its worst since moving to Los Angeles in 1960.
Terms of the contract were not disclosed.
In a weekend interview with CBS2/KCAL9 sports director Jim Hill, Scott said becoming the Lakers’ coach was “a dream come true.”
“I always wanted to coach the Lakers, especially when I go to coaching,” Scott told Hill. “It’s so unreal.”
Scott told Hill he is “excited to have the privilege of coaching” Kobe Bryant. Scott and Bryant were Laker teammates during the 1996-97 season, Bryant’s first in the NBA and Scott’s last as a player.
“Kobe and I have a great relationship and we have been talking about this for almost the entire summer,” Scott told Hill. “I feel that he is going to be helping me as well because we see the game in a very similar way. We know that we have to get it done on the defensive end first and he knows right now, in the last stage of his career, that he is going to have to do some things differently.
“I love the fact that people keep doubting that this man is going to come back and play great, because I know in my heart and knowing him the way I do that he loves those type of challenges. I am looking forward to having Kobe as a guy that I can turn to and say ‘Let’s get the ball to this guy and he can make things happen.”’
Scott, a graduate of Morningside High School in Inglewood, was an analyst on Laker pregame and postgame shows this past season on Time Warner Cable SportsNet after coaching 13 seasons in the NBA with three teams. His career coaching record is 416-521, a .444 winning percentage.
Scott guided the New Jersey Nets to the NBA Finals in 2002, losing to the Lakers, and 2003, losing to the San Antonio Spurs. He was selected as the NBA’s coach of the year for the 2007-2008 season when he was with the New Orleans Hornets.
Scott’s most recent coaching position was with the Cleveland Cavaliers, who he coached from 2010-13.
Scott becomes the Lakers’ 25th coach and 21st since their move to Los Angeles. He is the seventh former Laker player to become the team’s coach.
